How the Culture at Heinz Australia Has Changed - Assignment Example

Name Institution Course Date 1. Draw on each of the elements of cultural web to discuss how the culture at Heinz Australia has changed and is continuing to evolve under Widdow’s leadership Cultural web classifies six elements which are interrelated and constitute the paradigm which is a model or pattern of the workplace surrounding (Johnson, Whittington and Scholes, 2008). Through the analysis of these factors, one can begin to observe the broader view of the organizational culture: what is performing, what is not performing, plus what requires to be transformed. The elements of the culture web include: stories, routine and rituals, power structure, organizational culture, symbols and control systems. Through the use of the culture web, we can analyze how the culture at Heinz Australia has evolved through the leadership of CEO Peter Widdows. Past events at Heinz and what people said about the company where the employee’s self-esteem was low with high unacceptable turnover, low risk, punitive and very negative culture were the stories but this has changed to a ‘great place of work’ through the leadership of Widdow. The routines and culture of Heinz was where they have been concerned with their staff concerns like the free gym membership, health care program and so on. The power structure of Heinz offered no support to the staff, therefore creating confusion and conflict of responsibilities, but this has changed to where the senior managers model staff behaviors. Due to the control system of Heinz, there is mutual respect in additional to trust to the employees who do not have to be monitored now and then. The hierarchical structure represents the organizational culture of Heinz. All these changes have occurred on the leadership of Peter Widdows (Graetz, Rimmer, Smith & Lawrence, 2010). 2. Key forces for and against change based on cultural web The key forces that were against change at Heinz was the low risk plus the punitive culture in addition to the high unacceptable staff turnover, which was inward focused and everything seemed unattainable of surplus effort had to be used to accomplish it. With the staff having low motivation and high cost of hiring new staff to replace the ones leaving the company, it was close to impossible for the management of Heinz to adopt any changes within the organization this was also made difficult by the lack of support and nurturing of the staff in addition to the rigid organizational structure. However, with the leadership of Widdow, it has been possible for the company to embrace change through restructuring of the organization culture, creating a mutual respect and trust between the employees and the staff. Through Widdow’s leadership, he was committed to build a caring, positive society in which the ideas and contribution of the workers were acted upon and taken seriously. Through those initiatives, the CEO of Heinz, Widdow has transformed the change within the organization culture and it has changed from a negative culture to a positive culture (Graetz, Rimmer, Smith & Lawrence, 2010). 3. Key strengths of new culture When Widdow took leadership of Heinz, it was a difficult time at the organization. Research have shown that a strong organizational culture improves the organization performance through facilitation of the consistency in internal behavior (Sørensen, 2002). One of the key strength is that Widdow created a culture in which the staff enjoyed flexible working hours with the option of taking Friday afternoon off after they are through with their jobs. He also created an ideal work place in which the employee’s health and well being was being taken care of and creating a balance between the social and the work life, this included medical checkup and free gym membership and these proved to be motivating factors for employees in job performance. The mutual respect and trust where the employees were not monitored daily and they were not afraid of giving their ideas, but were encouraged to be involved in creating a great place of work was also a key strength. It is important to maintain an organization which is running smoothly. In the long run, an organization is concerned with efficiency, stability and predictability (Masood et al., 2006). This is another strength that has been achieved through the leadership of Widdow (Graetz, Rimmer, Smith & Lawrence, 2010). 4. Aspects of organization that need to be monitored and sustained to ensure the organization does not slide back There are five aspects of sustaining an organizational culture. That is leadership framework and communication, hiring practices, induction and employee involvement. Widdow and his senior management must always understand and respond to the market and must always adapt to the market changes. In order to do extremely well, organizational processes, behavior patterns and structure must be aligned with the market that the organization serves. Continuous communication between the different level of management and the employees is essential in sustaining the organizational culture. Communication should be done in a language that allows the workers to comprehend their routine application in the business. Organizational culture is often transferred from the older employees to the new and fresh employees, the mode of hiring and training new employees is a major factor in sustaining the culture of this organization. Heinz should hire and train talent that has passion, competence and attitude. The right people should be placed in the right roles within the organization. To sustain the culture, the employees must be involved throughout the company. This encourages the employees to participate in the sustainability initiatives within the organization (Bertels, Papania and Papania, 2010). With the above factors put into consideration and applied, the organization culture will be sustained and does not have a chance of sliding back into the old ways (Graetz, Rimmer, Smith & Lawrence, 2010). Case 2: Sun Microsystems 1. Principles of best practices demonstrated by Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems has taken an approach to improve productivity and carbon emissions. Change management allows organization to effectively and quickly implement change so as to accomplish the market needs and providing a competitive advantage. The first best practice demonstrated by Sun Microsystems is the dumping of the PCs in the favor of the thin clients. This has helped the organization to access files that are stored in a central server as opposed to disk drives which are inbuilt. The second best practice is allowing the staff to form work groups which have improved the eco-responsibility through acts like double sided printing plus turning off lights and air conditioning that are not in use. This has helped the company cut on unnecessary cost and also reducing the printing costs. Another best practice is the redesigning the floor space, relocating the administrators and allowing telecommuting. Video conferencing was used and it helped in reduction of air travels plus intra city driving. The last practice is the raising of the temperatures in the data centers thus saving power (Graetz, Rimmer, Smith & Lawrence, 2010). 2. Gains from the changes Through the practices practiced by Sun Microsystems, the gains received are immense. The change from PCs to thin clients has reduced the power consumption from over 100 watts to 4 watts. This has reduced the electricity bills by a huge amount this has also reduced the carbon emissions by 20 per cent. The redesigning of the space has increased the space used by the staff creating a ratio of 1:3 for a staff desk ratio and having the right sized offices for the employees thus they can work comfortably. Telecommuting allows the staff to work at their convenient place away from the office; this allows the staff to work efficiently and effectively and also reducing the office space thus reducing the operational cost (Illegems and Verbeke, 2003). By increasing the temperatures in the data centers, the carbon footprints have reduced by 6 per cent. The reduction in intra city driving and air travels has also reduced the amount of carbon emitted into the atmosphere. The company continues to attract more customers due to its reduction in carbon emission and being an environment friendly company (Graetz, Rimmer, Smith & Lawrence, 2010). 3. Can this example be copied by other organizations? Yes, these practices by the Sun Microsystems should be copied by other organizations. Telecommuting which can be applied by most of the business settings should be encouraged since it reduces the general carbon footprint, lowers the energy costs in the offices and increases the employee productivity. Reduction in the amount of papers used in the offices is of both economic and ecological benefits to the organizations (Qi, Shen and Dou, 2013). The e-meetings help in reduction of the travelling costs incurred by organizations and also reduce the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by the motor vehicles. If the companies emulate the example of Sun Microsystems they would reduce the amount of greenhouse gases emitted to the atmosphere (Graetz, Rimmer, Smith & Lawrence, 2010). References Bertels, S., Papania, L & Papania, D 2010, Embedding sustainability in organizational culture. A systematic review of the body of knowledge, London, Network for Business Sustainability. Graetz, F., Rimmer, M., Smith, A & Lawrence, A 2010, Managing Organisational Change, 3rd Australasian edition, Milton, Qld, John Wiley & Sons. Illegems, V and Verbeke, A 2003, Moving towards the virtual workplace, 1st edn. Cheltenham, Edward Elgar Pub. Johnson, G., Whittington, R and Scholes, K 2008, Exploring corporate strategy, 1st edn. Harlow [u.a.], Prentice Hall. Masood, S., Dani, S., Burns, N and Backhouse, C 2006, Transformational leadership and organizational culture: the situational strength perspective. Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part B, Journal of Engineering Manufacture, 220(6), p.941- 949. Qi, E., Shen, J and Dou, R 2013, The 19th International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management, 1st ed. Berlin, Springer. Sørensen, J 2002, The strength of corporate culture and the reliability of firm performance, Administrative science quarterly, Vol. 47, No. 1, p.70-91. Read More